Down the Rabbit Hole
"Down the Rabbit Hole" is the 1st episode of Once Upon a Time in Wonderland. Summary Alice returns home to her father telling her that everyone thought she was dead. Her imaginative stories about a talking White Rabbit and a mystical place called Wonderland end up getting her admitted into an asylum where Dr. Arthur Lydgate convinces her to have a procedure that will allow her to forget her pain. Right before the operation is set to take place she is rescued by the Knave of Hearts who takes her to the rabbit who informs her that her true love, Cyrus, is still alive. As the trio then jumps into the portal returning to Wonderland, Alice sets out on a quest to find him but the villainous Red Queen and Jafar have other plans for her. Plot 'Teaser' We are treated to the vision of a clearing in the woods. A small dining table, designed for children to use, is seen in said clearing, with several plush toys sitting in chairs around it. The party guests include a hare, a man in a hat and a mouse. The table looks abandoned, unkempt, with leaves and foliage scattered on top of it. The bigger chair, reserved for the very special guest, is empty. An explosive sound is heard as a wave of dirt comes flying from the earth, near the dining table. A young hand is seen grabbing onto the vegetation, and we then see a young girl, to whom the hand belongs, as she tries to hold on to the green ground and get herself out of the hole that just exploded around the area where she once lived. The young blonde, wearing a blue dress with a white apron and a blue tie over her head, smiles with glee as she stands on the area where she'd played before, and says, "Home." Exhilarated, the young girl starts running back to her house, crossing over a fallen tree log and dashing through a long field of green. The girl enters an estate and starts shouting for her father, repeatedly. She finally reaches her house, but is unable to open the locked door when she turns its knob. She bangs on the door a few times, with force, anxious to see her father again, and the latter opens the door suddenly and looks shocked to see her. The young girl starts to say that he will never believe where she's been - he merely says "Alice" as he looks at her with confusion and surprise in his eyes - and that it all began with a white rabbit who wanted to take her hand... The father interrupts her story, asking her if it's really her. "Who else would I be?" the girl asks, nonchallantly. The father claims that she was gone a very long time, and they thought she was... Alice asks him, "You thougt I was what?", to which he replies, "Dead." The camera pans away from them and into the hall of the house, as we start hearing baffled excerpts of a conversation shared in the future between Alice's father and a psych professional, Dr. Lydgate. As they discuss, behind closed doors, with Alice peeping on them through the keyhole and overhearing their conversation, the stories she'd shared with them, about hookah-smoking catterpillars and giant mushrooms, the father asks the doctor why Alice would lie, and is told that she is dellusional and making it up, and he can cure this. Alice, indignated, stands up and away from the doors and says to herself, "I'm not a liar. It was real. And I'm going to prove it." This said, she walks away. ''Once Upon a Time in Wonderland 'Act I' Present Day Storybrooke, Maine, nighttime. The clock on the tower over the Storybrooke Public Library tells us that the time is 8:15. A man is seen walking in the middle of the road as lightning strikes in the sky above him and the wind blows fallen leaves around. He walks, seemingly without a care, unaffected by anything around him, including the oncoming yellow buggy that is headed in his direction. The driver honks the horn and swerves to avoid hitting the careless and reckless pedestrian. Once it's gone around him, the buggy gets back on its lane. The man continues walking. A hand is seen locking up the front door to Granny's Diner, and the keychain is in the form of a pink tennis shoe. The employee in charge of locking up is the lovely Ashley Boyd, who tells her companion Leroy - the town drunk - that he's closing up the joint. As she heads down the steps, she looks up at the stormy sky as she comments that he's gunning for the "Customer of the Week" plaque. The careless pedestrian makes his way to the diner as Leroy starts to tell Ashley that the situation is win-win for them, she gets his mug on the wall and he finally gets... He is unable to finish his thought for the man walks past them but not without bumping into Ashley and catching her off-guard. Leroy tells the man that it's closing time, and Ashley adds that it looks like a storm is coming so he better find a place to keep dry. Leroy and Ashley start walking away, and the man turns back to them with a smirk and says, "I'll get right on that." This said, he reveals that he has taken the keychain from Ashley and swings it around his finger. He then uses it to open the front door to Granny's and gets in. Inside, he gets behind the counter and takes out a coffee cup, which he fills up. Then, he takes a dollar bill from his wallet and throws it on the counter. He then looks around and takes it back, storing it in his pocket again. He starts to sip his coffe, but is then surprised when the establishment starts to shake. A frame falls from a wall, the window shutters start to dance, and glasses fall from their shelf. A hole is pierced through the floor of the diner, with an exploding sound, much like the one young Alice once emerged from, and the diner's tables and chairs that were in its proximate area are sent flying. The man looks on as he witnesses someone familiar emerging from the newly-formed hole. The White Rabbit makes himself appear through the cloud of dust and shakes himself off, then turning to the man and saying, "There you are." "Bloody hell," the man says, then asking the Rabbit what he's doing there. The Rabbit says that he'll tell him on the way, they're late. The man places his hands on the counter and tells the Rabbit that he's not interested in his important dates, but the Rabbit claims that they're not late for something, they're late for someone. The man asks who, and the Rabbit answers, "Alice. She needs help. You're the Knave of Hearts. She needs you." The Knave doesn't look amused. Bethlem Asylum Elsewhere, in a realm that resembles the olden Victorian London, we see the darkened inside halls of a mental asylum, where a static young girl is seen being rolled around in a wheelchair by someone, as she holds a doll with a spider in its web latched onto it over the armrest. Then, the focus switches to that of a young woman being escorted into a room by several orderlies, her hands behind her back, walking slowly as other patients look on from the inside of their cells. 'Act II' 'Act III' 'Act IV' 'Act V' Production *The title of this episode was revealed by executive producer/co-creator Adam Horowitz, via his Twitter account, on August 8, 2013, along with a photograph of the script's cover.Adam Horowitz tweet. Trivia Reception 'Ratings' 'Reviews' Gallery Gallery of photographic stills released to promote the episode. 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